Wing testing

I now often hear wing-flapping noise in the bird-box when a chick is testing his wings!

Bird explosion

They are getting bigger and noisier every day

Seven young bluetits

The seven chicks are starting to look like real bluetits now with their greenish down and  white wing bar.

Mum cleans up after feeding a chick

Chicks starting to test their wings

Some of the chicks are now starting to test their wings

Seven chicks, developing nicely

As of today there are still seven chicks left and they are looking good. Their wing- and tail feathers are developing nicely.

Look at their wings!

And some of the chicks have their eyes open now.

Seven chicks left

Early this morning there were still 9 chicks, but by the end of the morning I only counted 7. Strange how suddenly they can die, but in the previous nest (2014) there were also suddenly many deaths around day 5-6.

In the video below you can see one bird swallowing a massive caterpillar. At that time there were still at least 8 chicks (and earlier I counted 9)

Swallowing a massive caterpillar

The video below shows the 7 remaining chicks this evening. It looks like the ones that died are the ones that were much less developed as could be seen in yesterday's video. There is not much difference now:

Remaining 7 chicks look more or less equally developed

Nine chicks left

Although all chicks looked healthy last night, today there were only nine left. So one of them must have died after that.

The oldest chicks are now showing the beginning of feathers on their wings. See for example the one at the top in the video and compare with his younger en much less developed sibling to the right.

Sleeping

Mother brings food